Blog Post

The Location Marker Icon Tutorial is great for budding inkscape designers! Designers who want to design some professional looking early on but with minimal effort. This Tutorial focuses on the Ellipse Tool, The Boolean Modes, Node control, the Dropper Tool and Gradients.

Firstly we are going to gradient colour every other map segment created with the division – moving from the left. Select the Gradient Tool {G}.

Then click and pull down on the first segment. Do this for the second segment as well. For the top nodes of the gradient use the The Dropper Tool and

select the colour # for the bottom nodes of each select the colour #.

Select the duplicate we moved off the canvas from the last step.

Active the Fill and Stroke Dialogue box. FILE MENU -> OBJECT -> FILL AND STROKE. Then select the tab “Stroke Style. Change the Stroke Width to “20px”. Then in the Stroke Fill Tab, will the stroke with the colour White/ #ffffff.

Place it over our map shape like seen in the above screen shot.

Colour Dropper ToolGradient Tool

Location Marker Screen 10

Using the Bezier Tool we will create roads in the map. For this section you can go wild :), just make sure the lines follow the contours of the map. I used the white /#ffffff, to match the border.

Bezier Tool

Location Marker Screen 12

For this next step we are going to create the circle point that the Location marker is showing. Using the Ellipse Tool create a circle and colour it white.

Then we are going to cut the circle in half along its vertical axis. There are many ways to do this, but we are going to using “Division” using a bezier line.

Activate the Bezier Tool and draw a line through the center of the circle along the vertical plane. Then select both the circle and the line. Navigate to FILE MENU -> PATH -> DIVISON.

Lastly move both semi-circles under the location point. Select the Left one and click on it once more to activate the Screw and Rotational Transformation handles. Then screw the shape on

the outside vertical transformational handle- upwards. Do the same for the right semi circle. Aim for it to look like the screenshot above,

Then select both shapes, and nagivate to FILE MENU -> PATH -> DIFFERENCE.

Using the dropper tool select the colour # .Then activate the Gradient Tool {G}. Click the new shape and pull downwards.

Ellipse/Circle Tool

Location Marker Screen 15

Lastly lets create the shadow. Duplicate the white border map {CTRL + D} and move it alight lower than the main main. Then step it down in the layer hierarchy, below our main map.

Then Navigate to the File and Stroke Dialogue Box {CTRL + SHIFT + F}. And then go to the Stroke tab and select the “x” to remove the stroke fill. Then go to the Fill Tab and set the colour to black, and reduce the opacity to 40%.

Then move the nodes using the Nodes Tool, so that the shadow resembles the screen screenshot above.